The present invention generally relates to methods of making patterned coatings. The present invention more particularly relates to methods of making patterned coatings by providing a pattern of energy to or removing a pattern of energy from a liquid coating and solidifying the resulting patterned coating.
Many industrial and consumer products contain layers of material that are created by disposing a liquid coating onto another material and then solidifying the liquid coating. In many cases, the material that forms such a layer is itself a complex system containing multiple components and phases. Examples of such layers include magnetic media and abrasive sheets. In other cases, the solid material that forms the layer may be nominally uniform in chemical composition but contain some other internal structure, such as molecular alignment or pores. Examples of such structures include polarizing films and porous membranes. The structure or form within such a layer is its morphology.
When such layers are formed from a liquid coating that contains volatile components, typically organic solvents, and those volatile components are subsequently removed or dried, the choice of initial formulation and drying conditions affect the final morphology of the layer.
When significant flow occurs in the liquid coating, as sometimes happens during solidification, the final morphology of the solid layer may be affected. It is often the case that such effects are considered defects in the final layer.